Healthcare fraud is estimated to cost the country $80 billion a year, and it's growing, according to the FBI and Health and Human Services Office of Inspector General.
And healthcare fraud prosecutions are on the rise nationwide, according to a recent report from the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse at Syracuse University, which tallied prosecutions brought under a specific Healthcare Fraud statute and found 366 cases last year, a 3 percent increase over the previous year.
In the Tampa area, the number of cases has fluctuated from year to year and was down in 2013, but officials anticipate a spike this year as cases that have been investigated begin to result in charges and more resources are being dedicated to healthcare fraud.